


melanydros

by bansheesquad (deathwailart)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Black Markets, Gen, Mercenaries, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-28 03:17:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20057152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathwailart/pseuds/bansheesquad
Summary: On a world experiencing a year of darkness, a mercenary is tasked with taking down black market dealers making life harder for most of the people as the government and military don't, won't, or can't get involved.  (There's not much difference as far as the people are concerned, not with the lies being spread about their staple food source being lost and dead zones in the ocean they rely on suddenly appearing.)And then, of course, a young local woman throws a grenade at a possible lead, she gives chase, and they decide to team up.





	melanydros

Outside the bar, beyond the tiny salt-crusted window, all the world lay dark. Darkest dark that wouldn't lift for a year or more now, Raleigh Zhivko settled at the bar proper where she half-watched the news feed up in the left hand corner, the scrolling text displaying stocks and more that blurred when she tried to focus tired eyes on it. At least the bar seemed to be turning a tidy profit but no matter the season, no matter the situation there were some businesses that would always be booming and those who were flush with cash had the sense not to be out on the streets. Those who weren't had come to a familiar place for comfort. For somewhere to drown their sorrows. The Great Lull, boom and bust in equal measure depending on where you made your fortune; the crash of tides familiar to the planet finally silenced, the din of construction taking over now and outside it was the light of the furthest of three moons that silhouetted the scaffolding that had already sprung up all over the planet. Something about the absence of constant waves and tides, a chance to scrape off salt and rust, making repairs after years of damage from the hammering the sea and storms unleashed that the pilot had seen fit to tell her. 

Maybe it had been better than her silence. 

Or some people had a pathological need to fill the air with the sound of their own voice.

Sitting here now, she did wonder how much of this bar was held together with the salt and rust. She'd stayed in far worse, more unsafe places than her hotel but knowing _why_ the scaffolding was there, knowing just how high up she was staying—there were doubts in her mind about the safety of it, the structural integrity of it. 

"Both my children left. Just—just took off." An older man, his voice trembling and the lines of hardship carved deep into his face, a man worn lean and bitter, dragged her attention back to the bar. Some were born to know the Lulls better than others, to wear the weight of them so that they aged before their time, subject to the ravages of time. "Gone. They just left me here and oh they say they'll be back, that's what they say, they've got work, they're—" his voice shook, same as the hands that clutched the empty bottle to him as if that would bring them back to him. "They're gone."

"Ah they're good kids, you know that." The bartender was tired, dragging their feet, shoulders hunched, hunting for tips that wouldn't come from an old timer, a regular in the better days. They set a little bot down on the bar to clean it that began a path around Raleigh and the man, the bartender picking up a screen, glancing back at the shelves before they scratched at light stubble on their chin then started tapping away at it.

The old timer shook his head. They hadn't even listened from the looks of it. "All this about the work they've got, didn't even ask my opinion. 'We'll send you money' but I need them here!" His voice trembled worse than it had before, beer spilling over his hand, down the bottle and onto the bar. The bot scuttled back over to clean it, veering off the path it had been making towards Raleigh with an urgent beep and flash: it reminded her of a beetle she'd seen somewhere on a previous job but the details escaped her. "It's not good for them, adrift, in space, on another world."

He was in tears. Raleigh signalled for another beer.

A grateful smile came Raleigh's way from the bartender as they veered off from their old timer. "They'll be back from and look at it this way: you'll be looked after, you won't need to worry about how it was last time. We both remember that don't you?"

There was only a sniff from the old timer in response to that as the bartender handed off the beer, better than the hotel's that somehow managed to taste as sterile as the rooms, and Raleigh tried to keep chewing her burger, even if it had gone lukewarm by now. Food was food and she didn't need her employers getting on her back about looking after herself but it was hard to eat something when she couldn't tell what it was; not meat, this bar sure as hell couldn't afford it, and the old timer had muttered some comment about it when she'd sat down, his wet reddened eyes swivelling, fixing on something to cling to as the drowning might. 

It hadn't comforted her but she'd said nothing. She hadn't wanted to be drawn into conversation with him, hadn't wanted his worries. 

When she was a third of the way through her beer and only a few bites through the mystery burger, all rubbery meat alternative, something shockingly salty for the sauce, buns that turned to paste as she chewed the old timer shifted himself off the stool with wobbling legs. He crashed into the table on the way to the door, a chorus of raucous laughter and jeers that he waved off from a crowd at a corner booth. Raleigh glanced over their direction: gleaming, clean, the kind pulling money out of his pockets and mouth, the sort who'd taken his children away as surely as the Great Lull. Raleigh couldn't help the stop herself sighing as she turned back.

"He barely made it through the last Lull," the bartender muttered dispassionately, "if they fish him out a day or two from now I won't be surprised." They took a break from the tablet to rake a hand through hair dyed shimmering blues and green.

"It's that bad already?" She asked, choking down the last of the burger – now cold – because she wasn't one to waste food either, especially in a time of scarcity.

"If you'd come here a few months back you wouldn't be making that face eating a burger in here." They were trying not to laugh, leaning heavily on the bar as she took a swig of the beer to rinse out the taste. "It's that bad."

Her question had to wait until they returned from taking and filling an order from the increasingly rowdy table behind them, the sort of drinks her employers drank sometimes, tall glasses, bright colours, scents that had her nose curling as it wafted past her.

"So…I've not been here too long, I don't know what that means. You get bad food plenty places I've been."

"The menu says algae burgers, I'd say it's the local speciality but that'd be saying too much unless you want the history lesson?" They paused, nodding when Raleigh shook her head. "Thought so, anyway the farmers come in here, talk all about their crops sat where you're sitting, you pick it up. Some of it's pretty interesting honestly. Anyway," they moved off to grab the bot once it beeped at the opposite end of the bar, sticking it under the bar out the way but not without patting it fondly Raleigh noticed. "Great Lulls? They fuck up all the tides because there's no tide at all. Algae dies off. They had contingencies, trade secrets, all that tight-lipped, smug smile, 'don't you worry about it' bullshit."

"Everyone's got that," Raleigh said for something to say but it was worth picking up as she rolled her beer bottle between her hands. "Tricks you wouldn't tell a soul for love nor money."

"I know I've got those, only way I stay in tips with the Lulls come about; everyone thinks they can do bar work but can they? No. Not like _I_ do at least." They smiled at her and Raleigh ordered another beer and one for them, something cherry red and with a smell that suggested it could fuel a ship at a push. No open flames at least, too many bars had had those go wrong. "Last Lull and this one? Algae dried up. All of it. Suddenly we can't get hold of it, no one can."

Raleigh sipped her beer, mulling it over. At least she'd be able to replay it later if she forgot. "How fast did it go? And how did it go this fast, I mean you're barely into it."

"I mean that's the whole thing, we've gotten through it before and this Lull isn't far enough along that our supplies should be wiped out. Everyone on the feeds," they jerked a hand back and slung back half the drink in one go, hissing in a breath that almost got a sympathetic wince out of Raleigh, "says we've got plenty or they did right up until it was oh the harvest was bad, oh there were infections, contaminations in the blooms. Funny thing I never heard anything from the farmers about that, you hear all about it when they even think when they've got a problem."

"But there's algae."

"But there's algae. If you can pay for it. Sell your organs. Sell your home. You might have to do that anyway just to get by but just for the algae? Fuck off. It's the same with the fish. The meat. Whole bunch of other things. They," another gesture back to the feed and then to the vacated stool, "said it's been getting worse and if our friend had stayed sober they've might've said a little more. He remembers years back, years and years. It's harder to remember as a kid, y'know? Or I was lucky enough not to."

Raleigh nodded. She understood what they weren't saying there as the crowd behind burst into riotous laughter, the crash of a glass hitting the floor and someone shrieking a name. She settled up, drained her beer, slid off the seat and headed out without a backward glance into the cold of the night. Or what she thought was night. It was difficult to tell when there wasn't going to be sunrise for over a year.

* * *

Waking in the dark when she was planet side always threw Raleigh off when the chrono beeped insistently, an attempt to keep her on a schedule so her body didn't start protesting viciously, no more than it already did to being in the dark after bouncing between various transports to get here. No day or not, only the waxing and waning of such a small pale moon with some sort of lamp the hotel provided as standard to guests to make sure they stayed fit and healthy as part of their stay, an artificial sunrise and sunset that signalled the start and end of her day. Well, never quite the end of Raleigh's day, her employers had picked the wrong woman for that but it was rhythm. Routine. Unnecessary for her growing up where she had but there was always the flashing of parts of one tattoo that told her that she wasn't getting enough sunlight so she hauled herself out of bed, got herself moving to work the beers out. 

In hindsight that hadn't been the smartest choice when she was still working the chems of a three system hop that had involved stasis for one leg of it out, body still wanting to slide back into the comfortable fog, but she'd relished it all the same, even enjoyed the burger in the strange way she missed the tastes of her childhood. The beers were part of working it out, she reasoned, part of getting on with the job too. Meeting people. Talking. Learning while she acclimatised.

The burger had been miles better than the ration packs she'd been allowed when she'd woken up where even the memory of the smell threatened to turn her stomach was than a high G spin before the mag boots engaged.

As the lights turned on in the bathroom as she stepped through, not bright enough to have her squinting or tearing up – and wasn't that just something else they'd consider here that they didn't elsewhere, another reminder of how far Raleigh was from anything familiar – she wondered how you became used to living in the dark. They had to, obviously, it was life here, lived from childhood the way the cycles played out but she was uncomfortably reminded of space more than she was planet side; a prior job of tunnels, labyrinthine, vast, crawling her way deep deep down beneath the surface to people who'd never seen the sky on their own home world, the way the weight of it had pressed into her own bones. 

"You're being an idiot, get on with the job," she muttered to herself, reflection a pale ghost; whatever tan she'd managed to build up on other worlds faded away by the hops to get here and rapidly fading. She'd not been meant to hold the sun, not coming from where she had. 

The dermal glowed in places. Time to shower. Time to drink. Time to eat. Time to get on with the job at hand then get herself off this miserable place before it sank into her too.

She tried not to think about the water dousing her skin in the shower, the same water that in all likelihood she still dumped steri tabs in to be on the safe side that fizzed away before she got to drink water in her room. Water that didn't taste anything like water despite any and all claims on the cheery packaging but better than drinking untreated water; if the waves and storms were anything as bad as indicated who knew if they'd checked those filters since they'd been installed ten years ago now.

* * *

With the pavements bone dry, the years of erosion were at last exposed in a way that they weren't when the tide regularly made its way over them at regular intervals, a different sort of treacherous that the clerk at the front desk saw fit to warn Raleigh of once again before she'd set out. Maybe it was part of the service or maybe her employers paid enough here that they hoped she'd come again since a hotel with the features hers had should've been busier, should've been teeming with clients. Now it was the Great Lull and it was a different sort flush with money. People like those Raleigh had glanced at in the bar, loud, braying, obnoxious about it. They were everywhere that she went, not that much different to most with money to spare but flaunting it in a time of crisis had always left a sour taste in her mouth, reminding her of home when she never cared to otherwise. The warning though _was_ appreciated; outside the hotel there was a small pool of yellow light that spilled out, the inviting sort to draw the eye, to hopefully draw people in but it didn't extend far, only far enough to allow her to see the pockmarks where a wrong step would send her tumbling with her ankle twisted at best.

There was a false sense of security to be had when the water didn't lap about the ankles. She assumed.

Besides, it was dark, and the algae had died so she'd been told, leaving a scum that clung to the inside of the bulbs she lingered under, blinking and tapping at her right temple to store pictures for later. No one was about to see her. Or that they held not even the faintest reflection of the moon in them.

Out of the hotel light, she rubbed her neck on the left hand side and one day she thought she'd get used to her eyes adjusting to darkness in a way they weren't meant to, the pupils dilating and contracting before they settled, that sudden prickling sting of tears at the flood of whatever it was exactly being released to allow it. It was one of the reasons she still preferred her visor where she could get away with it even if visors were old-fashioned but here it would look out of place and that was the whole reason she'd say _yes, fine, let's do it_ to her employers when they'd brought that to her. You had to keep your edge these days. This place was a glaring reminder of it. 

With the tread of her footsteps echoing over the uneven ground that she could actually see, Raleigh made her way with care, the air thick with salt and decay that lingered in the back of her throat, brine and fish and rot left to lay. She spat to try ridding the taste from her mouth, setting out for the market that had been a destination last night only she'd been too late to make it worth her while. Now it was—calling it morning didn't sit right with Raleigh but a glance at her wrist told her _yes, yes it's morning, you know it's morning_ and the state of it would lead her to where she needed to go next. 

Turning through a narrow set of side streets, Raleigh found herself in a darkened market, the air warmer than the street she'd turned off and she glanced about at the tall buildings flanking it on all sides, the multiple entrances people twisted their way in and out of. There had to be a way to get the stalls and bigger goods in through the buildings that she couldn't see from here but if it was storming normally then no one would be lashed by it tucked in like this. Smart. But they'd had so long to get used to it that she doubted they'd want a stranger to say anything about it and little else would give her away for an outside faster. People glanced over at her the way anyone had a right to when times were lean and someone dressed different to them did even if her weapons were as carefully concealed as she could make them, even if she'd learned over the years how not to try to blend in but to go for unassuming, unthreatening. A tall pale woman, dark hair scraped back off her face, the tattoos covered by her clothes, the worst of the scars from the job too. Nothing to give her away on first passing inspection as anything to be too interested in.

Lingering nowhere too long, she strolled between stalls, some of them bolted down so clearly regular, some of them nothing more than a series of grav-carts on their lowest power mode with goods laid out. There was talk and chatter between merchants and prospective buyers alike: the algae, the fish, the meat; they couldn't get antibiotics now too and when had that been a problem – did you hear that some of the immunisation bots were on back order?; a military coup but last year don't you remember the government changed three times didn't it so there you go maybe that's what we need even just to light a few fires under them.

Maybe it was better, she thought, to live your whole life in darkness than to be thrust into it. They'd had a more stable system down in city beneath than they seemed to here but that level of instability on a ten year cycle—

"You buying or you taking up space?" The voice jarred her out of her thoughts, coming from an older woman with greying tight corkscrew curls tied away from her face with a wrap. 

"Depends what you're selling."

"Ah nothing like what I used to, that's the way of it – pretty things, used to do good business with the scarves and jewellery but no one's got much mind for a little treat these days do they? 'Sides," she waved a hand over her stall as her mouth pulled into a half-smile, sizing Raleigh up and down for a potential sale, if it was worth her time to bother against the rest in the market, "can't get the supplies same as everyone else. 'Til the next tide, that's the last of my bounty here."

"All handmade?" Raleigh asked as she lifted a necklace of delicately carved beads for closer inspection, running her fingers over beads well-carved and smoothed but too imperfectly cut to have been done by a machine. 

"In the good days, have—sorry, _had_ a group I paid to go collect, I'm too old to go scraping about for what I need and to do the harvesting you understand." Raleigh nodded though again, back home that wouldn't have flown as an excuse. Maybe that was the difference on a planet then. "Got plenty of time to finish all the projects that've been sitting now but not the buyers, same as not getting anything to make that might appeal to a more," and here the woman's mouth twisted again, as if she was about to spit something foul, "_upscale clientele_."

Raleigh snorted. So that's how it was then, oh they certainly had it better other places but this she knew, this she was starting to know for this miserable little planet and the three moons orbiting it that brought them bounty and bust as they made their way about. "I've been hearing nothing but how fast it dried up."

The snap of fingers that came almost startled her and she set the necklace back down, picking up a scarf instead. Nothing said she couldn't buy anything, a scarf better able to travel safe with her the rest of the day than a necklace and something about it—well she'd get to go home for a while after, go see family, gifts from the job suited her better than volunteering stories of how she came by them even when they were asked after and she purchased it, exchanged the money and watched how the old woman didn't quite perk up but nodded. Something had changed that they were both aware of it, Raleigh worth her time, worth her trust. 

"I'm old enough I've seen more Lulls than you've had hot dinners, that's just how it is in something like this but the past couple? They've been bad. Bad enough that they take longer to recover from. Government not doing its job after and not doing it before so people wonder if they're taking some pay on it somewhere. You stumble about getting here?"

"Yeah," Raleigh lied though she would have if she didn't have the eye job. "Noticed all the streetlights were—well they're all dead."

"Who's meant to keep them alive but oh no the algae."

"Heard the same at the bar last night but," Raleigh leant closer, kept a smile on her face to avoid raising suspicion if anyone was looking their way but this had been a good stall to end up at, jewellery and scarves weren't the biggest giveaway she could have found in the grand scheme, "the farmers didn't say anything."

"There wasn't anything to say! Some of the people I employed to go harvest for me? They work on those farms too, doesn't pay a great wage if you're on the lower rungs but we all know that, everyone's just trying to get by and they saw them. All healthy as can be. And that big beautiful ocean out there? We take care of her. I hear all about other planets, all toxic this, no oxygen that but ours? She's kept clean, cared for, we look after her. They're even trying to hint that she's got problems too."

"Don't know much about oceans but—" Raleigh didn't get to finish that one, the woman cutting her off.

"Saying she's got dead zones. Our ocean…" 

And that was the end of it. A tightness of jaw, a threat of tears in her voice. Time to get moving, a nod towards someone whose name she'd forgotten to get – a slip she shouldn't have made – and now there was no time for her to get it. With the scarf tucked away she waded through the crowd, no one buying, everyone busy haggling instead, increasingly bad-tempered the longer the debates went on if they weren't the sort of discussions she'd had last night at the bar or at the stall she'd just left. All of it reminded her of home. When there'd been shortages. A lifetime ago, in the dark, the same shortages and rationing—had she taken this job because of that?

She shook herself. Her stomach roiled at the pungent aroma of fish coming from down another alley and she followed it.

Three figures with grav-carts laden with fish past their prime were ahead of her, out on the promenade beneath a bulb that did had light – artificial, not algae – but bright enough that she squinted, nose curling as she tried to fight the urge to gag, bile scorching up the back of her throat. Across the street were a cluster of people watching them, open hungry looks on their faces, not making a move towards them; if anyone had the money, they weren't coming yet as Raleigh lingered at the corner, pressing a button on her wrist to bring up a feed, scrolling through it casually. Best not to look suspicious as she watched, listened to them laughing quietly amongst one themselves.

And that was when all hell broke loose before she even knew what was happening. Where there'd been a the grav-carts and the three figures on one side with a hungry if resentful group on the other, then there was someone shouting, no, roaring, hurling a low grade concussive blast at the grav carts that sent blast waves out from them, bodies slamming back as fish and more sprayed high in the air. People shrieked from across the street, yelling coming from the market but no one moved, frozen by what they'd seen as the person who'd thrown the grenade, Raleigh recognised the blast from her own work as her ears rang and her teeth buzzed as she forced her body into motion, tearing after them. 

Whatever they were shouting, her ringing ears couldn't make it out, she was too busy trying to keep her legs under her on slippery streets as her head spun. Heart pounding, Raleigh lengthened her stride, tore around the corner with a hand outstretched to catch herself, a pothole coming out of nowhere in the dark that she missed in the dark after the flash that had blurred her vision. But she was fast, the stranger who'd set it off not fast enough that one last push wouldn't put her out of reach as she lunged, taking them both down with a clatter and a curse. Her tongue was caught between her teeth, blood flooding her mouth, eyes burning as she got an arm around the person beneath her as they struggled, knee in the small of their back. 

"Get off me!" Muffled as it was, there was no mistaking it for a woman's voice, angry if winded as she tried to fight her way free from Raleigh's hold.

"Shut up!" Raleigh hissed back as voices came closer, hauling both of them up and towards the end of the alley and round the corner, peering around it as she clamped a hand over the woman's mouth until the voices kept on down the street instead of coming their way. "What the hell was that all about? And don't start screaming."

Hand off their mouth, the woman swallowed, working her jaw as she glared up at Raleigh – she was a few inches shorter, pale in dark but that happened when she didn't use the visor to see, bleaching people out for some reason that no one had bothered to explain to Raleigh's satisfaction. "Fuck is wrong with you? You're not security—"

"I'm not," Raleigh agreed, glancing up and down the alley to check for anyone coming for them but the noise had died down. 

Maybe that's how it was here, after what she'd heard so far of the Great Lull, not when it was already as bad as it was. 

"Let go will you, I still feel your knee grinding my back into dust."

"You going to run if I do that?"

"Maybe." Her chin jutted out, arms moving so she could fold them until she remembered that she was being held against a wall with an elbow to her collarbones, forcing her to stay where she was, all of her coiled for a fight, hands clenching and unclenching. "What d'you want?"

"I want to know why you threw a bomb—"

She snorted and laughed. "It wasn't a bomb, it was a concussive, no one got hurt."

"Oh you know that for sure?" Raleigh asked, easing up on the pressure a little as she did, watching the doubt flit across the woman's face along with the guilt. "That many grav-carts alongside a concussive, it's a nasty combination, you were close to a building, and I've seen how much construction and repair work is ongoing at the moment. Could've been nasty. So…"

"You saw what they were selling, I saw you there. You must've smelt it at least, you couldn't have missed it. Them profiting off that?"

"And that's why you blew it up?"

"People are desperate for food and they'll profit it off, it's disgusting. I wasn't going to stand for it – how did you…oh."

"You shouted something, my ears just stopped ringing." Raleigh sighed, weighed her options and let go of the stranger. "Look I'm not security but I'm working on something they _should_ be working on that you might be interested in, is there somewhere we can talk that isn't a place we're anyone can come stumble over us any minute?"

"Yeah, this way." Pushing away from the wall, the woman jerked her head, looking Raleigh up and down. "I'm Harper, you got a name?"

"Raleigh. Raleigh Zhivko."

"And what are you doing here in our little circle of hell Raleigh Zhivko?"

"From the looks of things I think I'm doing the same thing you are only with a little more subtlety."

Harper laughed, rubbed her jaw and jogged down the street, Raleigh on her heels as they went, ducking through side streets into a rundown area that she imagined would have seen better days but for now was overtaken by hulking masses of storage containers, stacked dizzyingly high that Raleigh forced herself to look beyond them, stomach lurching when she could spy the cables, the beams, the pipes, any number of items peeking out of open compartments that, if they fell, would crush someone to death instantly. If they were lucky. The injuries she'd seen from these—well it didn't bear thinking about. And she'd grown up with this. This had been a playground if not so high when she'd been younger, it probably was now for children here who weren't so different to her, her friends, her brothers, all of them scrambling around construction yards on a derelict backwater while their parents worked, hoping they were keeping out of worse sorts of trouble. Some of the containers were rusted, relics of a bygone era, some even had barnacles and other things growing on them that she frowned at on the way past.

"It's seaweed, kelp," Harper supplied when Raleigh lingered too long evidently. "They don't go that where you've been?"

"Not on the buildings usually – people live here?"

"They do now, have for a few Lulls now 'cause it's cheaper to do it that way what with how it goes instead of the usual repair cycle and well, no one really bothers clearing up their waste so someone has to be enterprising enough to take it off their hands don't they?"

"But you're living in them and on a construction yard."

"At least we've got four walls and a roof."

That was a fair point, and they had lighting too, bright enough to have Raleigh's eyes burning as she was forced to squint in it, following Harper through a maze of shipping and storage containers that had been linked together the way they did with pre-fabs on new start-ups. She'd have said with less forethought on first inspection but it wasn't that: the pre-fabs she'd seen whenever she'd stopped off on those worlds and moved through them for jobs had all been one and the same, a template regurgitated as many times as needed or could be forced into a space to fit as many people as they could in even if it didn't make much sense. Now, as Raleigh's eyes finally adjusted to the lighting – she'd have to ask where it came from, how it was powered, just what the hell Harper was involved with and what was going on – she could see that it had been shaped as was needed, a taller wall to keep the spray off the sea off which was where the marine life had grown, open spaces for people to congregate but still sheltered. Homes that had tiers, levels, open areas where people were relaxing. 

This was another world unto itself that she'd stepped into, Harper scanning her palm against a side panel of one container (security and tech didn't escape anyone it seemed) then leaning in enough for whatever other scan had to be done. Optics she assumed, that was still the most common biometrics despite other attempts to switch them out on the market.

There were some changes people would always be resistant to it seemed.

Inside was darker than her hotel but brighter than she'd expected, a space more inviting than the containers it had been fashioned from suggested from the outside. As she followed Harper in, the door sliding shut – that took work to accomplish, there were skilled people here without a doubt, resourceful in a way that she _knew_ \- she looked about, unable to find seams or joins where parts and pieces had been welded and bolted-on to turn empty storage containers into a home, into several homes with muffled bass thumping through a wall from her closest neighbour. Even now Raleigh could still be surprised in a good way about by what she found on her travels, the little things that she was only drawn away from by Harper tossing her jacket onto a counter that had the look of something fashioned from salvage. Somewhere else, where it was fashionable to own pieces like that, someone with too much in their accounts (_the people who hire you_ she thought to herself) would pay handsomely for. Especially if they got to tell a patronising story about it into the bargain.

Raleigh was under few illusions as to getting her feet in the door and under the table.

"I owe you a beer after that," Harper said ruefully, two bottles already in hand and Raleigh wasn't going to argue with her as she took a seat. "If it makes you feel better, once word gets out round here I'll catch hell for it."

"You're not worried – thanks," Raleigh accepted the beer, twisted the cap off and took a long pull as Harper sat across from her. "You're not worried about whoever owned the grav-carts? Anyone higher-up than that?"

"Sure you're not security?"

"Didn't hear any coming, haven't seen or heard any since I got here."

Harper snorted, taking a swig. "They're in the same boat unless they've got side hustles, even something serious—depends who, what, where. Goes for all parties. Don't blame them when they're not getting paid _and_ the military'll hang 'em out to dry _and_ the politicians did that already. Caught the feeds?" Raleigh nodded, gesturing with her beer for Harper to continue, the woman up and out of her seat to pace in the small living room as her body settled, eyes adjusting. Her employers better not spy on her dermal.

There were only so many times a woman wanted to explain that drinking was part of the job and that she didn't have a problem. (She'd seen too many others go that way. They probably knew. Not like a damn thing was off-limits in files these days. Or in your markers. Not if you wanted in on certain lines of work with a certain sort of folk.)

Harper was still pacing, swigging at her beer, swallowing with a hand up and a deep breath until she could keep going. "So you've seen the feeds—actually what're you doing here?"

"Working, I think maybe we're on the same track as you are. Look," Raleigh set the beer down, leaning forward to not look at Harper's pacing feet. "I'm figuring this out so I can get in, get out, get paid. Simple as that. It's how this goes. I'd say not take it personally but after what I saw today? Tonight? Fuck I don't know how you people do this all I'm still out of it but maybe you're interested in being on board. Unless it's trouble for one or both. Considering that whole—"

"It's not the grav-cart crew," Harper groaned, sinking down into her seat, sliding _all_ the way down until she was barely in it anymore at an angle that had Raleigh's back hurting in sympathy. "It's here. Neighbours. People…it'll be awkward. They'll find out. They're not going to be happy about any heat it _might_ bring."

"_Might_."

"_Might_."

They sat in silence, finishing their beers, Raleigh allowing Harper to take a long look at her since she was the stranger in her home; even if she'd been invited, she deserved to know what was sitting there, drinking her beer in a chair that had no right to be as comfortable as it was. Her weapons were in plain sight, the armour light enough to pass in a civilian setting and Harper wasn't a slouch in any sense either if she was the sort of person to go around carrying grenades on her because even Raleigh didn't carry those casually, more trouble than they were worth most of the time. Here, in the light of her home Harper wasn't quite as pale as she'd seemed but there were hollows in her cheeks that Raleigh hadn't caught before out in the street, a sign of what she'd been through already. 

Sometimes…sometimes Raleigh regretted jobs once she was too deep in, her pride in her work not allowing her to say no once she was already there, already invested but this was a slap in the face. A reminder of home. Of where she'd grown up in ways she'd avoided since she'd left it behind outside of visiting because no, her mother wouldn't leave no matter the offers Raleigh made to her, she barely even accepted the money sent her way either because there was that damned pride again, wasn't there?

"If you're here for me then I've been a tit," Harper said finally, dragging herself back into something that at least resembled a seated position and not a slouch that'd end with her on the floor in front of her chair.

"Somehow I don't think so – I know about the shortages, I know about the security shit, the government and the military, I've been hearing about the algae and now the ocean; there's a black market, I know about that. You're not the only place out here with problems like that, maybe this is a unique situation driving it but you're not alone in that and no one's alone in the profiteering that springs up during a crisis _but_ there's vested interest in stopping it."

"Outsiders who give a shit?"

"I'm not saying they're altruistic. It looks good for them, they get leverage, all the usual but this is a mess. All of it. You know that. I know that and I've been here five minutes." 

"So what, you want me to tag along?"

"You know this place better, you know what's going on and you don't have a problem destroying carts full of rotten fish – are people really buying that?"

"People are dying." Any good humour Harper had previously died as she picked at the label on her empty bottle, mouth twisting. "Most of us here – I'm talking immediately here – aren't that desperate and we talk each other out of it but I guess if you're desperate enough you'll do it. Doesn't matter how it smells."

"It all smells bad to me," Raleigh admitted with a shrug. "I didn't grow up somewhere with that, all of it has me gagging."

"Okay then here's a tip: it shouldn't have a strong smell if it's fresh, all that? It's been dead a long time now with no tides and that gives the parasites in the stomach time to get into the muscle. If people don't cook it properly – and you know, we're assuming that everyone has the means to cook, some places have rationing of that, power cuts – then they'll pick up something awful. Something bad enough without treatment that they end up needing treatment."

"Treatment they can't get or can't afford unless they go to a dealer. And end up worse off."

"Now you're getting it."

"You got names?"

"Better. I've got a place, just didn't have anyone who'd come with me because oh that's too dangerous Harper, think of everything you'll bring down on our heads if you go."

Raleigh grinned, tapped the weapons holstered at each thigh. "That's not a problem: I've got that taken care of but I need to know if you can do more than just throw a grenade and run."

Harper threw back the last of her beer and smiled, rising to her feet in a fluid motion. "Why don't you come with me and find out then?"

* * *

If there had ever been a time in Raleigh's life where she'd believed in fate or luck or anything close to them then those years were behind her now, worn down long before she'd ever scrabbled together enough to set out from home in search of not precisely more, or better, only a dogged _wanting_. A queasiness that demanded _not this, anything but this_ that sat uneasily beside love for her family, for what had raised her, kept her safe all these years. And yet the universe conspired to tweak her nose. To catch her by the ear and insist that perhaps she'd be listen and pay attention for moments such as this. A walk, turning out of the alley, Harper, and now them out in a part of the city that hadn't even been on Raleigh's radar yet. But that was always the beauty of locals, why Raleigh had been working slowly, carefully, gently, to get to know people without spooking them which was always such a tall order in a time of impending strife and upheaval. They'd dodged Harper's neighbours on the way since she'd been right: the news had spread already, her name had been called, and maybe it had been Raleigh's presence that had kept them from coming when she'd turned and glowered.

"Maybe I should've hired someone like you a while back if I had the money for it," Harper had said, delighted by it, grabbing Raleigh by the elbow to keep them going through pathways that threatened to confuse, an empty oil drum turned to some sort of grill that enticed, music filtering up and out into the air.

It had all been an inviting reminder of home. It all struck too close to the bone and Raleigh had been glad to get out and away from it as much as she'd wanted to stop amongst a community that while not insulated from it, seemed more of a community than the people she'd come across so far, able to laugh, to joke, who clearly managed to have food to share with one another.

Questions for after. If there was one. Right now she and Harper were belly down in an empty office building that hadn't seen any occupants from months judging from the state of it, the layer of dust on everything, the staleness of the air; the alarm system had already been disturbed by someone and from how Harper didn't look at Raleigh as she took out her tools to get to work, she had the suspicion that if it wasn't her handiwork, she knew the culprit. It had been her suggestion for a vantage point. Much of the intel they were moving on was hers but intel was intel and as they lay on cool tile behind tinted glass, Raleigh with her visor up and Harper with homemade goggles over her eyes, a larger part of her than she'd be comfortable admitting was thinking of the bonus for an early finish.

"You see them?" Harper asked, voice dropped to a low whisper by Raleigh's right ear.

"I see them; you know we could've gone back to my hotel so I could've gotten the rest of my gear. I've got rifles and more. Scopes. Drones."

"Don't need those," Harper replied, shifting around in her peripheral then up into a low squat to rub at her knees. "Why aren't you sore?"

"I've been doing this for years, practice makes perfect." Raleigh allowed herself a proud smile because sometimes it was the little things and she did take pride in her work. "Look if this is going to work we need a little honesty here so do you actually know any of the patrols?"

"They don't have any, it's not that organised. Does that make it better or worse?"

"Six of one, half dozen of the other, they've both got their own problems when it comes down to it. And you're sure this is where they've been stockpiling?"

"See that guy down there?" Harper tapped the window gently and Raleigh looked away from her - she hadn't realised she'd stopped looking down at the street and the building across from them, a smaller office, warehouse attached, probably a packing or dispatch centre – to the street below. "You get lines sometimes, snakes round the whole street, down the corner, depends what they've got."

Raleigh swore softly as she strained her eyes, zooming in with the visors. It'd be easy enough to mistake one old, staggering man for another but this would be the cosmic scales balancing out wouldn't they? "I see him. I saw him at the bar before."

"Lot of old timers end up there, I mean it's a real mix but it's the way it hits the oldest that gets to you. Grandparents caught up in that racket." Harper rose to her feet. Both her knees popped as she did. "We going?"

"We need to decide what we're doing before we go." Raleigh didn't disengage the visor, rising slowly without taking her eyes off the man out by the front door until he was ushered inside by two figures in dark clothing either side where he was cut off from view. When she turned around Harper was tapping her foot, arms folded across her chest. 

With a supremely unimpressed voice, as if speaking to someone who was losing their memory and she the one tired of reminding them of a thing she'd had to dozens of times already, Harper said, "I thought we already had."

"You're the one that's new to this—"

"This is my lead. We're here. Because of me. I could've come here on my own."

"You had plenty of time and opportunity to come here alone before you met me tonight – actually," Raleigh gave half a smile, teeth showing, head tipped to one side as she readjusted her weapons so they sat comfortably, "did you know about me at all? All that about your neighbours and then this lands in your lap after I ask around---"

"Does it matter?" Harper interrupted.

It was a little too quick. A little too much colour in the high cheeks. 

Raleigh smiled. Rolled her shoulders back.

"Here's how it goes: I'm on a job where I'm getting paid and _you_ do not get to interfere with my pay, my reputation, my future employment prospects because that shit matters to me more than this, and you, and your planet's problems. But," she held up a hand to stop any future interruptions as soon as Harper opened her mouth, "I do want to help because I know that this is a mess, this is shit, and I get that you want to do something about it and hey, I'm in a position to help. So maybe we can do those both at once. Minimum of mess."

"I'm listening." _Reluctantly_, Raleigh thought as she watched Harper perch on a desk, leaving an impression in the dust. "What do you have in mind?"

* * *

When the smoke cleared and her ears stopped ringing there were bodies on the floor, some bloodied, some breathing; Raleigh's armour had taken a beating in the firefight, the old timer had shouted the whole time and hurled whatever he could get his hands on and Harper had done _something_ with the electrical systems that they hadn't quite managed to set right but they weren't alarming now. Not that it had brought security. Or the military. Only curious neighbours.

Most of them had left when they'd seen the state of things after Harper's speech, Raleigh sat in the back cleaning her weapons just to be safe. 

The old timer had filled his pockets, slapped some sort of sticky medical patch on Raleigh's face that she'd almost punched him for until she'd realised that he was right, she was bleeding, and she'd given him beer money if he promised he'd eat. He'd gleefully shown her the packets in his pockets that he'd swaggered off with, an uneven gait but he'd eat tonight at least and that was about all Raleigh could do as she uploaded the footage to her employers, awaiting payment. 

"So," Harper slung herself down next to her, "we've got a better bargaining position for now at least."

"They're going to come back. Or someone will."

"I've got ideas." Harper's face was flecked with blood, a layer of dust and ash in her hair that turned it grey and made her look wise. "Might even need someone on payroll to help out, what with the lack of security. Know anyone?"

"I might," Raleigh could feel the grin that shouldn't be creeping over her face, the adrenaline pulsing through her system, the dermal so bright she was sure it was glowing beneath her sleeve. "Schedule suddenly opened up."

"Well isn't that convenient for me? How about we step into my office. If I can find it."

Raleigh laughed, sliding off the crate, the gel patch pulling tight over her cheek. There were worse jobs to have and maybe a little time in the dark wouldn't be so terrible. Better than system hops, better than cryo, an employer who wouldn't be checking up on her. Maybe it'd even be the other way round for a change. "Well if you'd listened to me about the drones—"

Harper shoved her, muttering under her breath but she was smiling and Raleigh's head was still spinning from the chaos that her day and night had become as they went in search of an office to talk terms, both of them stinking of smoke and blood and more than a little of the fish that had been housed on ice in almost every inch of the building it seemed. Yes, there were worse jobs to have on the horizon and for once Raleigh wasn't in a hurry to get to them as she swung her feet up on the desk to split a packet of algae cakes they found in the drawer. Maybe, just maybe, for once the cosmic balance didn't have to go fuck itself in the light of the farthest moon of a tideless year; Harper's face lit the room, filled it with warmth as she laid out her plans, dreams of a community that hadn't yet been ground to dust.

Raleigh couldn't wait to get started.

**Author's Note:**

> a writing exercise between some of my longer projects that I might come back to later because I love sci-fi but never write it.
> 
> melanydros; ancient greek; with black water, of water which looks black from its depth


End file.
